THE DIREC TOR of undergradu- ate admissions at the Univer- sity of Washington will lead
a special panel to study the ethics
of paying per-student commissions
to overseas recruiters, the National
Association for College Admission

Counseling announced last month.
The director, Philip A. Ballinger,
who is widely regarded as one of his
profession’s most thoughtful members, will co-chair the commission
created to explore the contentious issue. James L. Miller, NACAC’s departing president, said he expects to
name the panel’s other co-chair, as
well as 15 to 20 commission members, by the end of October.

While the agent debate has raised
temperatures in both admissions and
international education, Mr. Ballinger, reached by phone in Seattle,
said he had no preconceived position
on the issue of how recruiters are
compensated.

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overseas. Washington does not payforeign agents, said Mr. Ballinger. Hewas ready, he said, to consider differ-ent points of view: “The image I haveof the commission is an ear, a big ear,to listen to everything.”During a meeting of NACAC’svoting delegates last month, the as-sociation’s leaders said that a thor-ough review of the hot-button issuewas necessary. “The intent is not tohave a witch-hunt,” Joyce E. Smith,NACAC’s chief executive, told theassociation’s delegates. “I truly be-lieve this is a time of exploring andeducation.”In July, NACAC announced that itwould set up a committee to recom-mend ethical standards for best prac-tices in international recruitment,surprising many observers, who hadexpected that the admission groupwould move forward with a propos-al to ban its members from payingper-student commissions to overseasrecruiters. (The practice already isforbidden domestically, under fed-eral financial-aid law.)

But Mr. Miller, who is also coordinator of enrollment research at the
University of Wisconsin at Superior,
said the organization needed time to
study the divisive issue. The panel
will consider alternatives to commis-sion-based recruiting, discuss ethical
standards for recruitment, and suggest new mechanisms to help prospective foreign students better understand American higher education,
and American colleges to more effectively attract students abroad. The
panel will report back to the NACAC
board and is expected to spend about
18 months on its assignment.

Mr. Miller said he was taking time
to winnow down the list of possible
candidates, noting that even at the annual meeting, more people were volunteering to serve. He said he wanted on the panel people with a broad
cross-section of perspectives, including a member of the American International Recruitment Council, an organization that sets standards for and
issues credentials to overseas recruiters. The group has been the strongest
voice in support of paying commissions abroad. “We want them in the
tent,” Mr. Miller said.

NACAC officials have said theyhope the group will represent manyvoices on the issue, by includingmembers such as overseas high-school counselors, registrars, for-eign-student advisers, and even col-lege presidents. “We’re trying to getas many people around the table aswe can,” said David A. Hawkins, theassociation’s director of public poli-cy and research. “The last thing wewant to have happen is to get to theend of the process and have peoplesay, ‘Well, you didn’t ask us.’ ”As more American colleges moveto more aggressively recruit overseas,the debate over whether to pay com-missions to recruiters has become in-creasingly contentious. Advocates forthe practice note that other countries,including Australia and Britain, al-ready rely on foreign representativesto bring in students. Locally basedrecruiters, they say, can help attractstudents in an increasingly competi-tive global market.